Published by | | | It was eerily fitting that the weekend before a mob of President Trump's supporters stormed the Capitol, I sat down to reread the book that my great-grandmother, Mary Jones Parrish, wrote almost 100 years ago. In it, she recounted and reported on the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921. From May 31 to June 1 of that year, violent mobs of White marauders completely destroyed the Greenwood section of Tulsa, transforming a prosperous African American community into a smoldering pile of rubble. The book was passed down to me by my late father, whose mother, Florence Parrish Bruner, was a child when it was written. She herself survived the massacre, which razed 35 square blocks of what was known as the city's "Black Wall Street" and killed as many as 300 Black Tulsans. "I was informed that the dead were so quickly disposed of on that night and day until it was impossible to ever get an exact record of the dead and wounded," according to the book, "Events of the Tulsa Disaster." | | | An undated photo of Anneliese Bruner's parents, Jeraldine Bruner and William Bruner Jr., with Anneliese's grandmother, Florence Mary Parrish Bruner. (Family photo) | Last Wednesday's breach of the Capitol by a mob that included white nationalists could easily be described with the same words and framing used by witnesses and commentators of Mary's day. And while the mob's actions last week did not cost me my life, livelihood or human dignity, they did cost me my sense of security. I felt that the wheels of civilized behavior were coming off the wagon — that the same appetite for terror that had been unleashed in Tulsa was afoot in D.C. The parallels were too stark to overlook. When the mob arrived at the Capitol around noon, I was watching on Twitter at home, about five miles away from the chaos in downtown Washington, D.C. My son, 32, and daughter, 39, grew up here and were also at home; we are weathering isolation together. They're accustomed to protests, but this was different. | That day, I was nervous but hopeful. It appeared that Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff had been elected to the U.S. Senate in Georgia's special election, offering a chance that the new president would have congressional cooperation instead of obstruction. I thought maybe things were finally going to change after four years of overt, unrelenting racism. | | | The scene at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. (Evelyn Hockstein for The Washington Post) | In reality, the cause for my optimism was probably another source of consternation for people deluded into believing that the election had actually been stolen from President Trump, delusion fostered and stoked by Trump's bombastic and false assertions of fraud. The faces of supporters at his rallies were often contorted with rage, and as he egged them on with lies and conspiracy theories, my intuition told me the potential for violence was never far away. When Trump had traveled to Tulsa in June 2020 for a campaign rally, I was terrified that tempers might flare, that people might be killed. The specter of the 1921 massacre flooded my mind. I was relieved when teenagers on TikTok turned that rally into a bust. But then came the rumblings of another rally: one meant to disrupt the official certification of President-elect Joe Biden's November election. | | | | Three need-to-know stories | | (iStock; Lily illustration) | 01.MAGA supporters are trying to co-opt #SayHerName. The phrase was originally intended to draw attention to Black women who are victims of police brutality. Now, far-right commentators are using the slogan in reference to Ashli Babbitt, the White Air Force veteran who was killed Wednesday as she tried to storm through the halls of Congress. 02.Researchers have found that the mortality rate for Black babies is cut dramatically when they're delivered by Black doctors: Although Black newborns are three times as likely to die as White newborns, when they are delivered by Black doctors, their mortality rate is cut in half. 03.The U.S. economy lost a total of 140,000 jobs in December, and women accounted for all of those losses — women actually lost 156,000 jobs, while men gained 16,000. A separate survey showed that women of color were hit particularly hard: While Black women and Latinas lost jobs in December, White women made gains. | | | | | A story to make you smile | | (iStock; Lily illustration) | Bianca Smith made history late last year — she was hired by the Boston Red Sox as a minor league coach, becoming the first Black woman coach in professional baseball history. The Boston Globe first reported Smith's hire on Dec. 31. She will work with the Red Sox's rookie league team in Fort Myers, Fla., with a focus on position players. She comes to the Red Sox from Carroll University in Wisconsin, where she served as hitting coach for the Division III Pioneers baseball team and an athletics administrator at the school, writes Matt Bonesteel in The Washington Post. Smith holds both a master's degree in sports management and a law degree from Case Western Reserve. | | | | But before we part, some recs | | (Marvin Joseph for The Washington Post) | María Alconada BrooksArt director, The LilyWhat's inspiring me: The work of Spanish artist Maria Herreros. Her distinctive work reflects her authenticity and reminds us that beauty and ugliness are invented categories. What I'm using so my long hair is not (such) a mess: This detangling, repairing treatment from Olaplex, which I combine with drops of argan oil. My hair is so thin, and I've always struggled with knots. I would love to hear if you have a better recommendation; you can message me with ideas on Instagram. What I'm reading: "A Manual for Cleaning Women." This collection of short stories from writer Lucia Berlin will keep you hooked. Although the stories are focused on the mundane, they're humorous and nostalgic. | | | | |
Commentaires
Enregistrer un commentaire
Thank you to leave a comment on my site